Emma Potter

52: Aunt Marge

"Do something about your hair!" Aunt Petunia snapped as harry and I reached the hall. 

I couldn't see the point of trying to make Harry's hair lie flat.Aunt Marge loved criticizing us, so the untidier he looked, the happier she would be.

 All too soon, there was a crunch of gravel outside as Uncle Vernon's car pulled back into the driveway, then the clunk of the car doors and footsteps on the garden path."Get the door!" Aunt Petunia hissed at me.A feeling of great gloom in my stomach, I pulled the door open.

 On the threshold stood Aunt Marge. She was very like Uncle Vernon: large, beefy, and purple-faced, she even had a mustache,though not as bushy as his. In one hand she held an enormous suitcase, and tucked under the other was an old and evil-tempered bulldog. 

"Where's my Dudders?" roared Aunt Marge. "Where's my neffy poo?"

 Dudley came waddling down the hall, his blond hair plastered flat to his fat head, a bow tie just visible under his many chins.Aunt Marge thrust the suitcase into Harry's stomach, knocking the wind out of him, seized Dudley in a tight one-armed hug, and planted a large kiss on his cheek.Harry and I knew perfectly well that Dudley only put up with Aunt Marge's hugs because he was well paid for it, and sure enough,when they broke apart, Dudley had a crisp twenty-pound note clutched in his fat fist. 

"Petunia!" shouted Aunt Marge, striding past Harry and me as though we were hat stands. Aunt Marge and Aunt Petunia kissed, or rather,Aunt Marge bumped her large jaw against Aunt Petunia's bony cheekbone.

 Uncle Vernon now came in, smiling jovially as he shut the door.

"Tea, Marge?" he said. "And what will Ripper take?"

 "Ripper can have some tea out of my saucer," said Aunt Marge as they all proceeded into the kitchen, leaving Harry and myself alone in the hall with the suitcase. 

But I wasn't complaining; any excuse not to be with Aunt Marge was fine by me, so we began to heave the case upstairs into the spare bedroom, taking as long as we could.

 By the time we got back to the kitchen, Aunt Marge had been supplied with tea and fruitcake, and Ripper was lapping noisily in the corner. I saw Aunt Petunia wince slightly as specks of tea and drool flecked her clean floor. Aunt Petunia hated animals. 

"Who's looking after the other dogs, Marge?" Uncle Vernon asked. 

"Oh, I've got Colonel Fubster managing them," boomed Aunt Marge. "He's retired now, good for him to have something to do. But I couldn't leave poor old Ripper. He pines if he's away from me."

Ripper began to growl again as Harry and I sat down. 

This directed Aunt Marge's attention to us for the first time. 

"So!" she barked. "Still here, are you?" Wasn't it obvious?

"Yes," said Harry. 

"Don't you say 'yes' in that ungrateful tone," Aunt Marge growled. "It's damn good of Vernon and Petunia to keep you. Wouldn't have done it myself. You'd have gone straight to an orphanage if you'd been dumped on my doorstep." 

I was bursting to say that I'd rather live in an orphanage than with the Dursleys, but the thought of the Hogsmeade form stopped me. I forced my face into a painful smile. 

"Don't you smirk at me!" boomed Aunt Marge. "I can see you haven't improved since I last saw you. I hoped school would knock some manners into you."

 She took a large gulp of tea, wiped her mustache, and said, "Where is it that you send them, again,Vernon?""St. Brutus's," said Uncle Vernon promptly. "It's a first-rate institution for hopeless cases."